Anna Karenina
discussion
Did anyone else absolutely loathe Anna?
I love Anna. I don't know and don't care the intentions of Author. All I know is, she chose to finish her life. She is not asking for Sympathy. Anna had her realizations and That was it. At some point or other, You will have the same realization and then you will probably begin to have a feeling for Anna.
I absolutely hated this book...talk about a woman with no self-esteem....
In the beginning I liked her. Then I started to dislike her, but still felt sorry for her. By the last quarter of the book I did loathe her, completely and unchangeably. She's immoral, selfish, bad-tempered, and completely off her rocker. I'm sorry. If I knew her in real life, I should be afraid of her and avoid her much as her neighbors did in the book.
Patricia wrote: "Anna cannot be viewed with 21stC sensibilities.She was a woman of her time, late 1870's, and forced to behave as such.
She had no possibility of fulfillment with Karenin and took a big chance wi..."
Agreed. I don't believe that Tolstoy cared whether we liked or loathed Anna. He was discussing bigger issues than just the love affair between Anna and Vronsky.
i feel sorry for her
Never really got it. Read all the way through once and tried a second time. I don't get the love affair that people have with this book.
Amanda wrote: "Perhaps one of the reason that Anna is so hard to like is that she only defines herself in relation to other people. Wife to a husband. Mother to a son. Lover to Vronsky. Who was Anna? What did she..."I've just finished reading and have reviewed Anna Karenina - then I came across this old review of yours. I think your analysis is exactly right - Anna never grew up and in fact shows us how not to be. Then again, most of the men in the novel, for all their philosophical and political learning are also not grown up!
Thanks Amanda.
Ian wrote: "As one of the reviewers mentioned, Tolstoy has a way of presenting a character in a disagreeable light and then later showing us their point of view. With Anna, however, I just could not follow her..."Obviously, you have never been married. One can detest a spouse yet stay married because of finances and children. Anna was a very unhappy woman, so was Emma Bovary. Also, understand the time. Women were trapped in marriages in the 19th Century. Unlike today, they could not get out of an unfulfilling marriage.
I thought it was too wordy and wonder if War and Peace is the same.
Emma bovary she is nothing like anna bovary wants to be rich with any guy unlike anna she just felt in love WITH ONE GUY read this twice ONE GUY "Vronsky "
BOvary knows more than 3 i guess THEN SHE KILLED HER SELF WHEN SHE BECAME BROKE !!
What I have read is that Tolstoy started writing this story intending to dislike Anna and ended up finding he could not. I don't know whether that is true, but for me it has always been a part of my encounter with this striking woman, whose story just may have saved more than one life, perhaps some even more than once. I am shocked and saddened by the lack of empathy for her I hear expressed in this thread. I ask how do you relate to the very real lives of those among whom we must live and who must relate to life within the parameters of their own personalities and fates, even as they make choices, some "good", some "not good."
Jennifer wrote: "I thought it was too wordy and wonder if War and Peace is the same."Tolstoy was never known for pithiness. War and Peace is one of the longest novels ever written, but I wouldn't call it "wordy." Rather, it contains a lot of words which, in combination, form an artistic masterpiece. Anyone who appreciates great literature should at least attempt to read it.
I didn't hate anna , but i dint really connect with her, but when i started reaching the end of the book i sensed what end she was marching towards.My favourite character is definitely Levin .
Pesadelo wrote: "I didn't hate anna , but i dint really connect with her, but when i started reaching the end of the book i sensed what end she was marching towards.My favourite character is definitely Levin ."
Pesadelo wrote: "I didn't hate anna , but i dint really connect with her, but when i started reaching the end of the book i sensed what end she was marching towards.
My favourite character is definitely Levin ."
He was my favorite too...
Oh, I disliked Anna, although its been quite some time since I read that book, around 10 years, I still remember the strong dislike of her, so strong in fact, that I have not even considered going back to re-read it
She reminded me of Emma Bovary by Gustave Flaubert. I saw the film of this one also. She was also controlled by her lusts and desires.
I was bored with Anna from start to finish. Levin is the character that makes the book worthwhile. There's about a fifty page break in the narrative where Tolstoy takes Levin out into the fields with the peasants, some of the best writing in existence. I have a suspicion that those pages are the reason Tolstoy wrote the novel, because they make all that drawing room crap glow with impotence -- but I'm almost always wrong.
I did not care for Levin´s character at all and i skimmed the pages where he was in the fields, imagining new ways of having crops and stuff; didn´t liked Kitty either - she seemd to setled with 2nd best because Vronsky dumped her.The one´s that i really liked aside Anna and Vronsky was Dolly and Stiva: now, there was a couple whose story was only told slightly and it spiked my curiosity - Tolstly could have given them a bit more of center-stage.
Maria wrote: "The ones that I really liked aside from Anna and Vronsky were Dolly and Stiva: now, there was a couple whose story was only told slightly and it spiked my curiosity - Tolstoy could have given them a bit more of center-stage...."You probably remember that Anna's first appearance in the novel was coming to "mend", or at least keep together, Dolly's and Stiva's marriage. A nice touch of irony by the author -- one wonders if Tolstoy even realized Stiva perhaps set a model of the possibilities of how to act as a human being, caught between responsibilities and stifling circumstances, at least as Stiva apparently viewed them and acted them out. But, I think it would take a few more generations to see so many parallels between male and female longings for a full and engaging life for oneself, and parallels in ways of being irresponsible.
Still, I like your ideas about how Tolstoy might have developed parallels, Maria. I am one of those who, while I like Kitty and Levin, sometimes find their portrayal in AK seems a bit too sanctimonious -- certainly not always, but sometimes.
But the ability to suspend judgment and simply portray being human is probably one of the great gifts of Tolstoy at his best. Anna may have some child-like qualities, but I would argue she is very much a woman, passionate and loving, albeit destructively so. Whether as a result of her own personality or the constraints of the society in which she lived or the interplay of the two or for other reasons are all part of the (magnificent) story Tolstoy offers for our consideration.
Lily wrote: I agree what what you said about the portrayls of Kitty and Levine being sometimes very sanctomonial: it´s was a bit enerving, at times, and Tolstoy wen on about it for what it seemd like ages.
Yes, what an irony that Anna was to be the one to mend Stiva and dolly´s marriage and all blew up in her face, her own marriage! Still, Dolly seemd to be developing a personality, an opinion for herself, thoughout the pages and, since her stoy was not very much developed, she didn´t had the chance to evolve a bit more; i remember the passage where she was in the carriage, allalone fpr a few hours and she took that time, consciously to think about her and her life because othwerise she was always too tied up in the running of the household - i thought that passage was delicious! Showed that she was not conformed at all, just didn´t want o leave the husband that she loved, but she was not blind, deaf or dumb.
I genuinely hated Anna. She was a selfish, shallow character incapable of any kind of foresight. It's not as if she was unaware or ignorant of the society she lived in, yet she chose to do the things she did, ultimately setting herself up for extreme and irreversible failure. Someone mentioned it's kind of like watching a friend make bad decisions. Personally, I don't tolerate people that asinine. This book was really hard to finish.
Jessica wrote: "I genuinely hated Anna. She was a selfish, shallow character incapable of any kind of foresight. It's not as if she was unaware or ignorant of the society she lived in, yet she chose to do the thin..."couldn't agree moer, i can't tolerate ppl like her.and yeah Tolstoy was way describtive.i expected readying AK to be more fun.
I am tempted to be judgmental of people who are judgmental.
Lily wrote: "I am tempted to be judgmental of people who are judgmental.""Claps" well said - judge and you shall be judged, in return.
As if none of us ever made bad decisions in life and still none of us is worth being hated for it. One can be aware of all the circumstances in life, surrounding society and still cringe and bith about it - the important things is: whinge and cringe to vent and then move along, make the best you can out of it.
Unfortunatly, Anna became very emotionally frail when her relationship with her son, Sergei, was severed. She went downhill from that point on.
Asinine is the person that made the comment, not Anna.
Maria wrote: "Lily wrote: "I am tempted to be judgmental of people who are judgmental.""Claps" well said - judge and you shall be judged, in return.
As if none of us ever made bad decisions in life and still ..."
And ridiculous is the person who gets offended by a comment about a fictional character on a discussion meant for strong opinion.
Jessica wrote: "And ridiculous is the person who gets offended by a comment about a fictional character on a discussion meant for strong opinion...."Then I am quite willing to express the strong opinion of not being offended by possibly being considered ridiculous! (I will hold out uncertainty exists such an accusation actually occurred in this conversation...)
Perhaps it is naive to wonder if reactions to imagined characters reflect the way we react to the people we meet and interact with in our lifetimes -- or about whom we sit on juries or include or exclude or....
I find it very difficult not to judge; in fact, I think to judge is integral to being human. Nonetheless, I do find it useful to consider when and how and why judge. I also would posit that there is a difference between judging and being judgmental. It is the later temptation for which I was (cynically) chastising myself (and asking about others), with tongue-in-cheek.
Jessica wrote: "Maria wrote: "Lily wrote: "I am tempted to be judgmental of people who are judgmental.""Claps" well said - judge and you shall be judged, in return.
As if none of us ever made bad decisions in l..."
Uhhh touched a nerve, hey?
What i meant, if you read it correctly is that as you are judgemental to a fictional character i can´t imagine what you do in your real life - you must have all sorts of prejudices and people you automatically include/exclude without much regard to circumstances or real look in to personnalities.
And as i can recall i never called anyone ridiculous - called asinine or maybe i should be clearer with people of you status of intelignce and called you "dumb" - at least it´s straightforward!
Oh, and if you gett miffed about talking of fictional characters or people that not abide by your views, then you are not in the right place: a forum is where you talk and listen or in this case type and read, and there are those who will agree and those who will not agree or not quite think the same way and that is called conversation, exchanging ideas and concepts. Agree to disagree is always a good ground rule; so as polite and good conversation, if if yoi don´t meet eye-to-eye with the other people´s opinions.
What does it mean to "loathe" a character, the fictional representation of a person? I am having trouble with the very question here: "Did anyone else absolutely loathe Anna?" It begins to "feel" like the old rub: "When did you stop beating your wife?"I can understand reacting strongly to certain behaviors of Anna Karenina. But, to me, at least, that is very different than reacting to her (emotionally?) as a "whole person" in a novel.
Do you think portrayals such as this one of Anna have been among the learnings that have led to modifications in divorce and child care laws? If so, has it been appropriate for such to happen?
Ian wrote: "As one of the reviewers mentioned, Tolstoy has a way of presenting a character in a disagreeable light and then later showing us their point of view. With Anna, however, I just could not follow her..."I think she is despicable and not worth feeling for. She brought her tragedy on herself...she stole somebody's boyfriend, she didn't love her husband nor her 2nd child; and she was suspicious of other people's feelings.
I don't think any person with this trait is worth loving or liking....
I loved her, I can understand her completely, she sacrificed everything for Vronsky. She followed her heart and not her head, she gave up everything and she had nothing left but him.
If you invest all of your emotions and hopes in a single human being, whoever they are, you are going to suffer horribly.
If I ended up being disappointed in anyone it was in Levin and his forced epiphany.
I had loved him and his constant spiritual struggling, the idea that he found that certainty and enlightenment that I can't, and that Tolstoy himself never could, is just silly to me. It's a cop out. A soul, even a fictional one, can't just suddenly become certain of God and His will because someone writes it down on a piece of paper. Also it condemns Anna. Levin sinned, but turned to God, and found happiness, Anna sinned, and turned inwards, and found ruin.
Tolstoy seems to me to be split between these two characters, they are both parts of his own self.
They both start out very real, they both struggle, and then suddenly in the end Levin converts artificially into the dream of what Tolstoy wants to be. Anna never stops being real.
The ending seems forced to me, it could be attached to a different book, it's just there to give a sense of completeness that doesn't exist in life as far as I can tell.
I guess the ending was kind of fatalistic in that she went on the train tracks, but I guess she was so despondent in the direction that her life was taking, she took the only way out available to her. Granted, not the right choice, but her choice.
At the time Vronsky and Anna K's fatal attraction commenced, is it appropriate to claim he was committed to any female, albeit Kitty was infatuated by him? (Levin already wanted to claim Kitty.) Vronsky came across like a ladies man at that point in his military life. (Tolstoy doesn't supply much in the way of ages, but Kitty was probably a teenager while Vronsky and Anna were possibly both in their twenties.)
To "loathe" someone, you have to be up sloce and personnal to asser that - a strong word to evaluate a fictional character.One may like or dislike actions/ decisions or choices but in th end do not know one bit more that the author writted about the character.
I think that although Anna did and chose and acted all by herself in the end she was so cuaght u in her downward spiral tha the only possible end that she could envision wat to die; but on those split secunds before the train ran over her, she repented, but was too late, already.
As someone posted before, when you invest your all in that one person, the chances of getting hurt are very high.
I guess we can't really loathe someone, like you say this is a fictional character, we may not like their decision that he/she made, and that is what makes this Anna Karenina so compelling. It also reminds me of Gustave Flalubert's Madame Bovary, have not read the book, but have seen movie adaptations. Now Emma Bovary I absolutely loathed.
I understood Anna better than I understood Levin. I had a hard time figuring out what Tostoy was doing with the character of Levin. The whole crisis of faith thing seemed out of context. For me, Kitty was a far richer character. Suffering from a broken heart, she picked herself up and learned to nurse the dying. Her stunning devotion to Levin's dying brother was the most heroic scene in the novel.
I only liked her when she stepped in front of the train.
LOL - i think I was very glad to finish reading that book. Perhaps I'm far too strong a person, or perhaps I just haven't been in her situation to understand it. But I felt Anna was a silly ninny and I could not view her in a sympathetic light - so I agree with you. Or perhaps I was too young when I read the book (17 years old) and it was rather long, tiresome and eventually tedious (for a teenager).
I did hate her especially after she left her child for Vronsky. But I never feel any sympathy for a woman who leaves her children behind for another man. Tolstoy did a masterful job of portraying a woman loosing her grip on sanity after society turns away from her. She finds that the love of a man is not making up for all that she has lost.
For those of you who find it difficult to empathize with a woman who abandons the care of a child for her own sake, I suggest Gail Godwin's
Father Melancholy's Daughter
. It probably took me years (after reading it) to develop empathy for the mother in that story who abandons her daughter to the care of her father. Much harder for me to understand than Anna Karenina, caught in the social expectations and legal constrictions of her age; in some ways, refusing to bow to the hypocrisies of her class, although such was one option she had. To me, it is heartbreaking to watch Anna Karenina choose suicide. But then, part of the reason I read is to understand what I wouldn't otherwise comprehend about the world around me and the people in it. (Evensong, also by Gail Godwin, is a sequel that slightly touches on the impact of her youth on the woman who grew up to somewhat follow in her father's footsteps. As I recall, I wanted more on that aspect of the story, i.e., the abandonment by her mother, but it is a number of years now since I read these books.)
These are not stories of the literary masterpiece quality of Anna Karenina, but they can bring valuable insights into the human condition.
I will definately admit that Anna was selfish and seemed to think that she was somehow exempt from the consequences of her actions. Instead of realizing her errors and picking herself up determined to turn a new leaf, it sounds like a it's some pity party throughout the entire novel. But I also think that without Anna being the way she is, the book would lack a lot of the depth and complexity that comes from the entire situation. While Anna is not my favorite character (that spot goes to levin in the end) I could not imagine this novel feeling complete without her being exactly the ways she is.
I read the book a long time ago. I enjoyed the book and recognised the skill and art in the writer's craft and his genius. It rang true and it felt like seeing a slice of life crystalised for the reader to examine in minute detail.But in my opinion then and still now - Anna Karenina the character is a complete and total dollop.
Dollop = a soft, mushy lump.
I've posted this elsewhere on AK threads. Given the recent release of the movie, I'll post it here as well so if of interest to anyone still following this topic. I find the review to be as much about the novel as the movie.http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs...
I feel like there were a lot of ways to read Anna's story and character. On the one hand, there was criticism of how marriage was handled by the older generation (particularly mothers), putting the emphasis on status and creature comforts over love. Anna's mother encouraged her to marry Karenin based on his position. Dolly/Kitty's mother encouraged Dolly to marry Oblonsky based on his position (although there was at least love there, at some point), and wanted Kitty to marry Vronsky for the same reasons. The only couple who ends up happy are Kitty and Levin, which wasn't Kitty's mother's first choice.There is also the possibility for critique of divorce at the time, which was unappealing because it would require one party to take fault and be unable to remarry. Also, the fact that completely taking a child from another parent was even a possibility...that is incredibly cruel, but mostly a reflection on Karenin's character flaws.
There is the critique of then-modern masculinity: godless, scientific, striving for useless government positions and roles, urban and disconnected from the land and true labor. Nowhere is this critique more evident than in Oblonsky and Vronsky, who are treated as rather silly men who, though not lacking in feeling, lack the sterner stuff that should make a man, according to Tolstoy, put his family responsibilities and the serious aspects of life first, over frivolous pursuits like gentlemen's clubs, cards, politics, and affairs. Even Karenin proves to be incapable of love, putting his career above his family, alienating his wife, and having only a cold sense of duty in raising his son.
Anna is meant to be a tragic figure, in my opinion, wronged by her mother, her husband, society, and finally by her lover. The blame is to be placed not on her, but on a world where authentic feeling is not only lacking, but discouraged. The glittering, superficial social world she lives in where the focus is on status, material wealth, and entertainment--which Tolstoy views as distinctly European, not Russian--has made it impossible for a woman who only wants love *and* family--the natural desire of any woman according to Tolstoy; just look at Kitty and Dolly--to be able to find both. She is corrupt because her entire society is corrupt; she is lost because there is nowhere in her society for her natural desires to come to fruition.
The only characters outside of this are Levin, Kitty, and Dolly, who all ultimately end up living together in the country, living close to the land and away from the immoral and godless Moscow and Petersburg. They believe in god, focus on their children, and live simply, within their means. (Even though Dolly is continually having to cover her husband's debts.)
It's hard to hate Anna, when the purpose of the book was not to critique any individual person or even a person filling a certain archetype so much as to critique an entire society. It bothers me that some people walked away from the book feeling sorry for Vronsky, who was as much a child as Anna, unable to do his duties at home because it was more fun to be out in the world, angry at Anna for not caring for his child when he himself shows little interest in it, who had in fact lost interest in Anna before she gave birth and only wanted her again because he believed her to be beyond his reach--something he couldn't have. In the end, marching off to what Tolstoy clearly believed was a silly cause to die because he was unable to cope with his well-deserved guilt, not only in regards to Anna but also in regards to leaving his child to be raised by another man. Anna and Vronsky were both corrupt, it's just that their society allowed Vronsky, as a man, to still be acceptable, while Anna, as a woman, had to be a pariah with very few options left to her after things fell apart with Vronsky other than to live out her life alone and in poverty. No wonder she (view spoiler)
On a final, slightly different note, I couldn't help but think that Tolstoy wrote a fairly accurate portrayal of a woman suffering post-partum depression completely by accident. Anna's alienation from her daughter, her growing feel of hopelessness and despair...these are classic signs of post-partum depression. You can say she's whiny, selfish and has no self-esteem. I see a woman suffering from depression after a traumatic childbirth who has lost everything--both her "natural" family in her husband and son, and her "love" family in her lover and daughter--and has nowhere else to go.
It's unfair to compare her to Scarlett O'Hara, who was notably written 70 years after the time she supposedly lived in and existed entirely in a romanticized fantasy world. These are books and characters with entirely different purposes. Scarlett was written to show what an individual can achieve and overcome through single-minded and often ruthless ambition by a nostalgic author. Anna existed to show the corruption of a society by one of her critical contemporaries.
I didn't loathe Anna, I loathed Tolstoy. As a lit teacher, I felt I was a fraud if I didn't read this book, so I forced myself. Tolstoy's pedantic over-moralizing and torturing both Anna and us when she has an affair, nearly left me ready to leap under the train with her. The only good thing was the timing: I was sitting in the bleakest place on earth, the waiting room to juvenile court (ready to testify for a student) when she hurled herself beneath the train's moving wheels. PERFECTLY matched settings.
I liked her at first, but the way she treated Vronsky put me right off her. All Vronsky did was love her despite what she'd become in society. I disliked that she thought, because she was unhappy with her marriage, that Russian society would change for her. It takes more than one person, more than one love affair, to change that sort of perception. She should have known that from how her brother acted.
Mostly agree with what's been said here. Anna started off as a strong, loving woman and I continued to like and sympathize with her even after she started an affair with Vronsky. My reasoning was that the poor girl had never known love (or lust) as she was in an arranged marriage to a man much older than her who took little to no interest in her. Of course she finds a young passionate man to whom she is attracted and who claims to love her quite tempting. I cannot fault this, everyone deserves to experience passionate love. However...the one thing that no one has really mentioned here that really bothered me more than anything else was how she treated her husband. No, he was not the ideal husband, but he always treated her nicely and was kind to her. She becomes repulsed by him, cringing when she sees him and claiming to hate him. The man did nothing to her, except not be the love of her life and she acts like he's the most disgusting awful human being ever and that she can't bear to be around him for a second.
The second thing I cannot forgive is that she abandons her son.
But she is fictional. Tolstoy has used Anna as a vehicle for preaching his morality, and of course he wrote during a time when readers were infinitely more patient. I am not sure Anna really died under the train; in a metaphoric sense, I think Tolstoy may have beaten her to death.
I thought she was exceptionally shallow. As I get older many of the faces of men I have loved have faded but the memory of my child's face burns bright. To leave your child for a man is totally inexplicable to me.
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Agree with you. And the last lines are pretty good analysis.